


Live it up

by Vodkalover308



Series: Duel Adventures [1]
Category: Yu-Gi-Oh! GX
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Autism Spectrum, Father-Son Relationship, Mental Health Issues, Multi, Original Character(s)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-21
Updated: 2019-02-21
Packaged: 2019-11-01 13:29:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,034
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17868137
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vodkalover308/pseuds/Vodkalover308
Summary: As a disclaimer, I know very little about how the actual card game works and my brother wanted me to create an original deck with original cards. This is a birthday present for him. The main character is based on him. Basically, Yugi and Seto are married with children and their oldest child is based on my little brother and yeah. My little brother really loves Yu-gi-oh, and he asked me to write a story for him for his birthday present. Which is kinda funny cause he doesn't really like reading. Anyway, I hope you all enjoy it.





	Live it up

**Author's Note:**

> As a disclaimer, I know very little about how the actual card game works and my brother wanted me to create an original deck with original cards. This is a birthday present for him. The main character is based on him. Basically, Yugi and Seto are married with children and their oldest child is based on my little brother and yeah. My little brother really loves Yu-gi-oh, and he asked me to write a story for him for his birthday present. Which is kinda funny cause he doesn't really like reading. Anyway, I hope you all enjoy it.

It was a normal quiet morning at the Kaiba residence, everyone going about their usual daily routine. Seto was sat at the dining room table sipping his coffee as he typed away on his laptop, Grayson and Milicent were also sat at the table eating their multi-coloured cereal sloppily, and Kassim sat quietly sketching out a new character design while Yugi munched on his toast and marmalade. The family sat in comfortable silence, just enjoying the feeling of being together. The silence was only broken when Yugi cleared his throat and looks over to Seto. Seto barely glanced up from his laptop to look at his husband, eyebrow raised in question. Yugi sighed and gestured over to Kassim, who was still enthralled in his sketch pad. When Seto finally understood the queue he closed his laptop and cleared his throat. This finally made Kassim look up from his sketchbook and to his dads. 

"Kassim, your father and I think that it's about time we put you through school," Yugi said sternly, foreseeing the argument that would soon follow. Kassim tensed up at the thought and shook his head. 

"But I'm already taking online courses, " he pleads softly, his eyes were so wide with fear one would think he was being led off to the chopping block. 

"We know sweetheart, but you can't just keep yourself cooped up in your room typing away on your computer." Yugi pointed out as he grabbed a wet rag off the counter to clean Milicent and Grayson's sugar covered faced. 

Kassim groaned and slumped in his chair, "But Dad does it," he countered. 

This made Seto chuckle, "I have a company, a school and an amusement park to run. That's my job, a job that honestly made me grow up too soon. Your father and I don't want that for you," he said sincerely. 

"But, what if everyone hates me? What if I go non-verbal and no one understands me? I haven't ever been in school with people before. What if I screw everything up?" Kassim choaked looking up at his fathers tearfully. 

Yugi sighed and shooed the younger two out of the dining room and pulled Kassim into his arms, whispering to him about how everything was going to be okay now. Kassim just nodded and relaxed in his papa's arms. Seto also made his way over to the two and dragged his finger through the gaps between Kassim's dreadlocks. After a few moments of silence, sitting on the cold hard dining floor, Kassim had finally composed himself enough to speak.

"When do I have to go?" he asked quietly, relishing in the comfort of his parents' warmth. 

"The entrance exams are tomorrow. So you better revise your deck." Yugi replied, rolling one of Kassim's dreads between his fingers. 

"What!?" Kassim gasped, "and you decide to tell me today!?" 

"That's your father for you, now get your butt upstairs and edit your deck, you are not failing the entrance exams at my school." Seto teased and gestured towards the stairs. 

________________________________________________________________________________

And that was how Kassim now found himself seated, leg bouncing as he impatiently waited for his name to be called. He looks around nervously at the students already seated in the bleachers. His gaze must have lingered a little too long when he catches the glare of a black haired boy up in the group of prep students. He flinches at the iciness of the stare and looks back down at his feet. 

"Wow," he murmurs to himself, "I don't know if I can do this..." Kassim lets his eyes wander across the room once again. He stays there in his hunched over position for a few more minutes, contemplating his impending doom when He suddenly hears a hilarious butchering of his name over the intercom, 

"Will Kaz-sim Za-har Kaiba please report to duelling field 3." Kassim takes a deep breath before grabbing his duel disk and briskly walking towards the duelling fields. He's so jittery that he almost passes his assigned field and into an entirely different one. 'Maybe I should just duel really badly so I don't go....' he thinks as he stands on the other side of the field. He mulls the idea over as the duel begins and he summons Changeling Child (1100/850) in defence mode. The Proctor smirks and destroys it with Beaver Warrior (1200/1500), this jolts Kassim out of his pondering stupor. Kassim shakes his head to clear his thoughts and looks down at his hand, he mulls over his options and nods, his dads would never forgive him if he didn't try. He grabs 3 cards from his hand quickly does the math in his head and nods, finally beginning his turn. 

"You destroying my Changeling Child enabled me to search my deck for 2 spell or trap cards and I choose Enchanted Bow and Golden Arrow. Now I summon Elven Hunter (1700/800) and equip him with both Enchanted Bow and Golden Arrow, boosting his attack by 900 and allowing him to attack you twice during my battle phase." Kassim explains with a grin before chuckling, "Which according to my calculations should finish you off perfectly, Now Elven Hunter, finish him off." And with that Elven Hunter draws his bow and releases his arrow, destroying Beaver Warrior, dropping the proctor's life points down to 2600. Now with his target's life points wide open Elven Hunter lets loose his final arrow, dropping the proctor's life points to 0. The proctor has a shocked look on his face before he comes out of his stupor and addresses Kassim.

"Welcome to Duel Academy young duelist." He states simply before allowing Kassim to walk past him. Once back in the waiting area he wanders around a bit before sitting next to two boys one with light blue-green hair and another with brown hair. 

The blue-haired boy awkwardly flounders for words before the other boy beside him spoke up enthusiastically, "Hey, I'm Jaden and this is Syrus. That was some duel, over in 2 turns, wow you're a pretty good duelist. What's your name?" Kassim doesn't respond and just grabs his backpack and takes out his sketchbook, flipping to the page where he was last working. He is just getting into the drawing when he feels a furious gaze boring into his very soul, he looks up and sees quite a few glares directed at him from the prep students. Kassim swallows uncomfortably and looks back down at his sketchbook, trying and failing to will away the growing unease building in his chest. Unable to concentrate he snaps the sketchbook shut and shoves it back in his bag dug around for his phone. Just as he find's it, it begins to ring. He quickly removes the phone from his bag and puts it to his ear. 

"Hey sweetie," Yugi's voice wafts soothingly from the receiver, calming Kassim almost immediately. "How did the duel go?" He asks his voice soothing, but not pandering. 

Kassim takes a deep breath before replying in the calmest tone he could muster, "Y-yeah, I just finished. It-It wasn't too hard," Kassim looks around him once more, mapping the area to find the quickest escape route for when the last duel ended. He takes another deep breath before turning his attention back to his phone, "Wh-When can I leave and go home?" he tenses when he sees the questioning look Syrus was giving him, he hadn't even noticed that Jaden had gone up to do his duel. 

There was a long pause from Yugi's end as he heard his siblings shouting in the distance about juice and pretzels. "Well," Yugi starts before he is interrupted by another screech. "Your father's stuck in an emergency meeting and I can't leave with Gray and Milli acting up like this," Yugi continues, making Kassim's heart sink. But a light appears at the end of the tunnel when he hears his father, 'but'. "But, if you're up to it you could walk to Grandpa's game shop and wait for us there. I'm sure he could use the help," Yugi says, and this makes Kassim's heart leap for joy. 

"Okay papa, I'll do that. Thank you," Kassim replies happily. After a quick good-bye, Kassim hangs up the phone and shoves it into his pocket. He zips up his backpack and throws it on, before all but sprinting out the quickest exit. He breathes a sigh of relief when he finally emerges from the building. Kassim looks around, gauging where in domino city he was, and the quickest route to his great-grandfather's game shop. After a few minutes debating in his head, he decided to go right and begins walking the familiar route until he finds himself at the doorstep of Kame Game. 

"Welcome to Kame Game, how may I help you?" A moody looking teenager says from behind the counter, not even glancing up from the magazine he was reading. Kassim doesn't respond and just walks to the door a short distance away from the counter that led to the living area of the shop. The teen from behind the counter looks up in confusion when he doesn't get a response, and then jumps up from his spot just as Kassim reaches for the doorknob. 

"Hey buddy, you can't just walk in and open whatever doors you want." The teen reprimands hotly, reaching to grab Kassim's wrist. Kassim jerked his hand away before the teen could grab it and rips the door open with his other hand. The commotion draws the attention of Kassim's great-grandfather who was standing on a latter, dusting some knick-knacks on a high shelf. The old man climbs down from the latter and turns to look at the door. 

"Ah, Kassim. Yugi said you would be coming," Solomon says softly, waving at his oldest great-grandchild. Kassim nods quickly, eyes still focusing on the floor close to Solomon's shoes. Kassim walks past the teenager and then plops down on the sofa in the centre of the living room. "Yeah, you just sit there while I go make some nice green tea for us to enjoy. Does that sound alright?" Solomon questions Kassim as he pulls his headphones and laptop out of his backpack. Kassim nods slowly and puts on his headphones, trying to drown out the slight overwhelming feeling clawing at his insides. Solomon smiles softly and dims the lights as he walks out of the room. Kassim sighs and closes his eyes letting the soft rolls of piano keys and the deep baritone of cello strings wash over him, cleansing him of the staccato thump of his heart ringing in his ears. He stays in contented immobility for what seems like hours, until the soft bitter sent of green tea wafts into the room. He cracks his one of his eyes open ever so slightly when he feels the sofa dip slightly, and is greeted by the sight of his great-grandfather holding a steaming mug out to him. Kassim slowly sits up and takes the mug from Solomon. He blows cold air over the cup for a few minutes before taking a cautious sip. After drinking about half of the mug he sets it down on a coaster on the coffee table and turns to face the old man while pulling the heavy knit blanket off of the sofa. Solomon smiles at the action and places his own mug down of its designated coaster. 

Solomon sighs and looks at Kassim expectantly, waiting for Kassim to recognize the cue. Kassim nods and removes the restrictive gloves and slowly stretches out his fingers. 

"Can you talk?" Solomon asks Kassim. 

Kassim shakes his head and signs back, "No." 

Solomon nods in understanding and continues, "Should I go get Acorn and Poppy from your room?" Kassim looks down at his hands and rubs the material of the thick blanket between his fingers and nods. Solomon nods back and gets up to go get the two Hamsters. Kassim waits, patiently looking at the staircase leading up to the bedrooms. He is justly rewarded when Solomon comes back down with two hamsters and a bag of unsalted sunflower seeds. Kassim reaches for the two hamsters and laughs when they run up his arm to burrow into the soft fabric of his collar. 

Solomon smiles at the boy's reaction and points to the laptop sitting on the coffee table, casually asking, "What are you watching?"

Kassim turns more to face Solomon before letting go of the hamsters to free his hands and let them roam around over his shoulders, "Figure Skating," he signs back. Solomon smiles again and nods before grabbing the phone off of the charger on the coffee table. He walks out of the room while dialling a number on the phone. Kassim smiles and turns his attention back to the images on his computer screen. He sits there, alone, playing with his hamsters as he watches the skaters glide across the ice, marvelling at the fluidity if their motion and how well it matched the music. Kassim sits there for hours, just sipping tea and cuddling his hamsters. He sits there, completely enveloped in a blanket of calm contentment. Then something finally dawns on Kassim, he is supposed to leave on Friday, today is Thursday. He leaves tomorrow. He will have to pack, eat dinner, go to bed, wake up, and say goodbye to his family in the morning. The nauseous weight suddenly returns to the pit of his stomach. He doesn't have time to dwell on this idea before he hears the bell at the front of the game shop ring. He turns his head to stare at the door on the other side of the living room, counting the number of footsteps before the knob begins to jiggle. When he sees this he closes his laptop and puts it in his backpack. He is just throwing his backpack over his shoulder when the door opens, revealing Seto, in his trenchcoat-clad, CEO glory. 

"Hey dad," Kassim signs simply before trying to pry Poppy out of his hair. Seto chuckles at the failed attempts and walks over to his son to help him pry the black hamster out of his hair. After Seto finally pries the hamster out of Kassim's dreds he puts it into the travel cage he was holding. Kassim reaches up to his shoulder and easily pries Acorn off of his shirt and places him into the cage along with Poppy. Seto closes the cage and hands it to Kassim, who gingerly holds it to his chest. 

"You ready to go?" Seto asks cooly, to which Kassim nods in agreement. Seto nods and gently guides Kassim out of the shop with a casual wave goodbye to Solomon. The two of them climb into the limo parked outside the game shop and are silent the rest of the way home. This was honestly what Kassim loved most about his parents, neither of them felt the need to break the contented silence Kassim displayed for the most part. They knew he was just a quiet boy, not necessarily needing the constant impute of noise. Kassim sighs in relief when the limo comes to a stop in front of The Kaiba Mansion. He darts out of the vehicle the second the door opens and runs up the stairs and through the already opened doors. He continues up the stairs to his room, where sets the travel cage down on his desk and pulls one of his suitcases out from under his bed, plopping it down casually on top of his bed. Kassim quickly glances at the alarm clock on his bedside table before striding over to his closet and grabbing the majority of his broad collection of turtle-necks, along with raiding his dresser for pants, underwear, socks and other essentials. He expertly Tetrises in the garments before quickly slamming the lid to the suitcase down to trap the clothes inside. He stands there quietly before turning to look at the hamsters still playing with each other in their travel-cage, completely oblivious to the emotional turmoil their owner was in. 

Kassim looks back down at the suitcase laying on his bed before picking it up and luging it over to set it down just beside the door. He looks back at his room once more, then exits the room and runs down the stairs towards the dining room. When he arrives the table is already set and the rest of the family is just sitting down. Yugi looks up and smiles at Kassim before gesturing him over to sit at the table, which Kassim promptly obeys. Kassim smiles brightly at the spread of Egyptian and various other Middle-Eastern food spanning across the table. Kassim breaths in the rich sents of the food before he reaches out and dishes some hummus and naan onto his plate. He begins to eat when he hears a small voice from across the table. 

"Why does Kassim have to leave tomorrow," Grayson asks quietly as he takes a massive bite of kofta. Yugi looks up from his food and turns to look at Seto, eyeing him in anticipation.

Kassim swallows his food slowly before looking down at his little brother to answer, "I have to go to school, you know, just like you have to. And the school I am going to be going too is really far away, so I have to go live closer to the school." 

 

Grayson adopts a contemplative look, as he seemed to think the idea over. This contemplation lasts for a few moments before Grayson looks up at Kassim and nods while continuing, "Okay, you're not gonna be gone forever right?" Kassim smiles and nods before returning his attention to his food. After dinner, Kassim helps to clean the dishes until it about 9 o'clock, when he leaves the kitchen and continues on with his nightly routine. He breezes through his routine and then finds himself laying in bed a whole hour earlier than usual, and despite all the thoughts endlessly swirling and rattling off in his brain he finds sleep comes all too easily and he drifts off into a restless slumber.

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you enjoyed reading this. Please tell me whether or not I should continue it, cause I kinda like this. And if you have any questions about the characters or story feel free to ask.


End file.
